Beautiful winter visitors – but mind your fruit.

Once winter sets in I know we’ll be visited, sooner or later, by these stunning birds, though it hasn’t always been the case. These birds are long-lived and flocks develop routines, visiting particular locations (like our neighbours’ garden) year after year for decades, to dine on autumn and winter fruit.

Not a particularly useful name, Satin Bowerbird, as the vast majority of birds are females and young males that are green-brown with distinctive scolloping on the breast and belly. Only adult males, once they reach about seven years of age, develop their metallic, satin plumage. As beautiful as they are, you may live to curse them if they develop a fondness for your garden. The location of our neighbour’s decades-old garden is firmly imprinted in the DNA of ‘local flocks’, as they are very regular visitors and they stay for weeks at a time. Not satisfied with soft fruit such as winter-ripening persimmons, Satin Bowerbirds have very catholic tastes and will even eat carrots out of the ground and shred silverbeet leaves that they feel must have been planted just for them.